the world's unemployed youth: revolution in the air?

[bcbm]

A common thread to the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt and protests elsewhere in the Middle East and north Africa (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/arab-and-middle-east-protests) is the soul-crushing high rate of youth unemployment. Twenty-four percent of young people in the region cannot find jobs. To be sure, protesters were also agitating for democracy, but nonexistent employment opportunities were the powerful catalyst.

Youth unemployment is similarly dire in other parts of the world. In the UK, young people aged 16 to 24 account for about 40% of all unemployed, which means almost 1 million young adults are jobless. In Spain more than 40% of young people are unemployed. In France the rate is more than 20%, and in the US it's 21%. In country after country, many young people have given up looking for work. A recent survey in the UK revealed that more than half of the 18- to 25-year-olds questioned said they were thinking of emigrating (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1368117/Lack-jobs-force-Britains-youth-abroad-look-work.html) because of the lack of job prospects.

Unemployed young people comprised a large portion of the crowd that marched in London on March 26 (http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/mar/26/anti-cuts-march-police-rioters)to protest against the economic policies of the government. Fortunately, the protest was largely peaceful. But youth unemployment will continue to stay high, and the coalition's austerity measures are not going to help. We're deluding ourselves if we believe the young will simply continue to be stoical and deferential to authority.

continued:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/apr/04/unemployed-youth-revolution-generational-conflict

[Dunk]

The rising tide of anger among 20 somethings like myself gives me hope - and I'm very interested in how the worsening conditions for not only 20 somethings but people in general affects their consciousness or political affiliations. If anyone knows of any literature specifically on the subject of radicalization of society, please suggest it to me.

Just as a small, personal example, I recently posted an update to my facebook account.


I've been seeing an "IN" campaign started for Obama's 2012 Presidential run. You can count me out. There is no way I'm being suckered into the "lesser of two evils" argument any more. Between the continuation of Bush policies like the Patriot Act, financial sector bailouts, a complete lack of interest in holding any of the criminals in Wall Street responsible, the wars and opening of a third war, the lack of any type of support for even a Public Option during the health care tragedy, his lack of support of workers in the most recent struggles across the US, lack of support for campaign finance overhaul, to his calling for cuts in regulation in The Wall Street Journal - it's crystal fucking clear that it simply doesn't matter whether a Democrat or Republican is elected President.I received the "likes" I expected from some of my left oriented friends, but was stunned to receive several "likes" from friends I would typically describe as conservative - with a veteran friend (whom in the past described himself as a conservative and expressing conservative views) surprising me with his response - "Couldn't agree more. Our system's shit." I even received several likes from liberal friends whom I know were extremely enthusiastic in their support for Obama in 2008.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

I think the unemployment crisis is a chance to educate classmates on the flaws of the capitalist system,and show them an alternative.It depends on them actually being interested,but I find it is rewarding when they actually want to talk about something other than sports,sex,television,etc.

[Jose Gracchus]

I said, rather than donating your time to Obama's personality cult, why not put the same time and energy directly with co-workers, neighbors, and classmates into organizing on the basis of your needs to directly meet them in your everyday life? That's real grassroots, and real change, not mechanically reading off some cut-out his PR firm stamped out for him.

[Dimmu]

I think the unemployment crisis is a chance to educate classmates on the flaws of the capitalist system,and show them an alternative.It depends on them actually being interested,but I find it is rewarding when they actually want to talk about something other than sports,sex,television,etc.


Exactly,

When people are not working all the time, they have time to think. Youth is especially pissed of because they have been promised a lot from their parents and the state and now they have studied their guts out, took loans, but there are no jobs and the old "immigrants took them" excuse does not fly anymore.

[MarxSchmarx]

Youth unemployment, as terrible as it is, is a HUGE opportunity that exposes the utter ineptitude of the left today.

One question this does raise is how to carry the class struggle outside of the workplace. If youth unemployment (as opposed to underemployment) is high and young people are indeed giving up on work, they can't be co-workers we organize with now can they?

There is of course the educational institutions, but these are highly circumscribed because they are transitory and moreover the bulk of students think that they will be employed - that is why most are there in the first place.

This is less of an issue in some areas like the middle east where there are very well-established neighborhoods and young people aren't nearly as isolated from other generations as they are in the global north. Often those people are plugged into large familial networks that are somewhat effective at spreading political communication - the Islamists for example use this strategy, as well as the mosques, to spread their ideology.

Reaching out to the chronic or serially unemployed to send our message needs to be one of the top priorities of the movement. Those with unstable jobs like day laboring are very amenable radical demands, but most of their conscious raising happens around the workplace when they have work. Unfortunately it is something which the organized left has hardly given any thought. This has to change. Perhaps something like facebook and other online awareness raising is a step in the right direction but it won't be nearly enough. Definitely networking at marches and advancing the socialist ideals even at reformist gathering is key, but in my experience often that can be a bit like preaching to the choir - even with the high youth unemployment in the UK for example the 3/26 protest numbers are a tiny fraction of the total unemployed. If someone is willing to go out and protest, odds are they don't need to hear much more from us than they can usually figure out on their own. Another slightly less lame option might be to have booths outside employment centers with snazzy banners that have catchy versions of something like agitate don't job hunt or some such. None of these are particularly effective but the point is not thinking about this is just idiotic.

[Le Socialiste]

It is certainly something worth watching, however this anger won't go far unless guided by a conscious, militant understanding of the class antagonisms inherent in the current crises and capitalism as a whole. The youth of this world (myself included) will have to face a world reminiscent of the earth our grandfathers/mothers inherited from their parents. The labor movement's gains over the past century (if one could call them that) are being rolled back, and deeper, more oppressive measures are being taken to ensure that such reversals are permanent. Unless labor rises up, we will have to deal with a capitalism desperate for increasingly scarce resources and capital - and once it has devoured everything else, it will have nothing to do but devour itself. There's no doubt that the current economic crises are sparking social and political dissent, but unless we recognize what is necessary to revive the struggle for working-class actions, we only stand to endure yet another defeat at the hands of our own indecision. There is growing frustration, yet I fear that such feeling will only be hijacked for the benefit of some party eager to take advantage of the situation. It's happened in Wisconsin, Portugal, France, Egypt, Libya...everywhere the ruling-classes are seeking to ride the wave of anger towards the further exploitation of the international working-class. Certainly revolt is in the air (I hesitate to say revolution, as that word has been thrown around so much that its meaning has been largely lost), however it won't amount to anything unless it is solidified into a militant, class-conscious movement. The youth of this world have nothing to gain from playing the game of bourgeois party politics...any revolution must represent a complete, fundamental break with the present state of affairs. That means we can't rely on the regular channels of "protest", but actively work towards the subversion, dismantlement, and eventual destruction of the capitalist state.

[Delenda Carthago]

I think there should be a worldwide campaign, "why in the time where we can produce the most wealth, we are poorer than ever?". This would make people think a lot about how the shitstem works I think.

[Gorilla]

I sure as shit wasn't a communist before the recession happened.

[human strike]

I think the unemployment crisis is a chance to educate classmates on the flaws of the capitalist system,and show them an alternative.It depends on them actually being interested,but I find it is rewarding when they actually want to talk about something other than sports,sex,television,etc.

I think the unemployment crisis is a chance for young people, largely ignorant of Leninist ideas, to show the old school socialists how class struggle is really done. Some of the most militant and creative activists I've seen in the last few months are recently radicalised and non-indoctrinated. This I find particularly exciting.

You can't teach revolution.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

One question this does raise is how to carry the class struggle outside of the workplace. If youth unemployment (as opposed to underemployment) is high and young people are indeed giving up on work, they can't be co-workers we organize with now can they?

Committees of the unemployed that link up with the struggles of employed workers.

Imagine the magnified power of a strike that not only attracts thousands of unemployed workers to the picket line, but raises as a demand the employment of all those people and any "replacement workers" at the desired rate. Now the bosses are battling not only the striking workers, but the reserve army of labor and "replacement workers." That makes it a a real class battle, and one that is capable of spreading.

[MarxSchmarx]

Committees of the unemployed that link up with the struggles of employed workers.

Imagine the magnified power of a strike that not only attracts thousands of unemployed workers to the picket line, but raises as a demand the employment of all those people and any "replacement workers" at the desired rate. Now the bosses are battling not only the striking workers, but the reserve army of labor and "replacement workers." That makes it a a real class battle, and one that is capable of spreading.

Sure that sounds great, the question is how does the left organize it to be something on a mass scale? One problem with unemployment is that it is in some sense "diffuse" (though certainly not always) - we may personally know a few people that are unemployed but unlike coworkers we often don't see them or spend much time with them every day. If we had a powerful presence in the labor movement, for example, we could ask each worker to bring someone they know who is unemployed to the strategy meeting. But even then we are only barely getting a toehold into the unemployed population. Plus the bourgeois media doesn't bother reporting strikes. Such committees require a critical mass of unemployed to be at all an entity that could flex working class power, so how would you propose getting there from our current state?

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

I don't think "the left" organizes it. I think the left organizes it's own organizations, outside the class. The workers have to organize these things on their own.

If it happens it will be because the workers needed to do something; to find a way forward. If there are militant and advanced workers among them, all the better, as they can point out these sort of things and make the argument for such actions when conditions allow.

A few unemployed folks could raise the call for the creation of a local committee. It's quite possible they would get a good response in this climate. They could branch out from there.

You can find lots of unemployed workers. You can go to job fairs, open calls, government unemployment offices or job programs, etc.

Or come to my house.

[ckaihatsu]

---





I think the unemployment crisis is a chance for young people, largely ignorant of Leninist ideas, to show the old school socialists how class struggle is really done. Some of the most militant and creative activists I've seen in the last few months are recently radicalised and non-indoctrinated. This I find particularly exciting.




You can't teach revolution.





1. What is going on and why it is important to understand it.

‘Revolution’, today with the events currently going on in the Arab world this seems to be the word on everybody’s lips. The first thing that it is necessary to understand when discussing the subject is that not everybody means the same thing by it. The term revolution seems to have been completely devalued today so that any change of bosses is deemed a revolution, from the ‘Rose Revolution’ in Georgia to the now called ‘Lotus Revolution’ in Egypt, where not even the bosses have changed, with seventeen of the old twenty-seven cabinet members still in government, we have been treated to a whole series of so-called ‘revolutions’ by the media; the ‘Orange Revolution’ in the Ukraine, the ‘Tulip (or Pink) Revolution’ in Kyrgyzstan along with the ethnic cleansing that accompanied it, the ‘Cedar Revolution’ in Lebanon, the ‘Purple Revolution in Iraq (this one was actually a term used by Bush, which didn’t catch on at all), and the ‘Green Revolution’ in Iran, the list goes on and on.

For us as communists, a revolution is not just the change in management of the current system. It means a fundamental change of the system and the overthrow of the capitalist class, not just a change of faces. That is why we completely reject the idea that what is happening today in the Arab world and Iran are in any way revolutions. If they are not revolutions though, it raises the question of what the nature of these events actually is. It is not only the mass media that is talking about revolutions but also many of those on the left as well. Are they all wrong? And if they are wrong what do these events mean for the working class?

http://en.internationalism.org/icconline/2011/04/middle-east-libya-egypt-class-struggle-and-civil-war

[Left]

I don't know about a revolution, but a radicalization of the youth is already taking place.

Here in Sweden we have among the highest youth unemployment rates in the European Union and those that do get jobs are hired at McDonalds or Phone House as part-time workers with third world working conditions and when they are burned out they are replaced by the ever-increasing reserve of young and unemployed people who would do anything to get the cash to buy junk like iPhones because they think it makes them happy.

The consumer society is tearing this country apart, and most of these young people don't know anything about politics, unions and workers' rights so the bosses run them into the ground and they just take it.

The radicalization isn't going the way you'd want it to though, mostly people are turning to the far-right and the neoliberals but when you talk to the youth that supports these parties they sound like marxists rather than libertarians. Hopefully, when they get older, they will realize that their views lie to the left.

[Tim Finnegan]

I sure as shit wasn't a communist before the recession happened.
Same here. The recession and, perhaps more importantly the state reactions, made it pretty clear to me that trying to make capitalism work for us, even as part of a reformist program, is a mug's game.

[rallycat]

Same here. The recession and, perhaps more importantly the state reactions, made it pretty clear to me that trying to make capitalism work for us, even as part of a reformist program, is a mug's game.

Good to see that this is happening. I was a communist before the recession, however I wonder if I would not have turned into a social-democrat by now if the crisis had not affirmed the continuing validity of Marxist economic theory to me. We are so marginal (even now) and it's hard not to feel like you're just being a crank during boom periods.

[rallycat]

Sure that sounds great, the question is how does the left organize it to be something on a mass scale? One problem with unemployment is that it is in some sense "diffuse" (though certainly not always) - we may personally know a few people that are unemployed but unlike coworkers we often don't see them or spend much time with them every day. If we had a powerful presence in the labor movement, for example, we could ask each worker to bring someone they know who is unemployed to the strategy meeting. But even then we are only barely getting a toehold into the unemployed population. Plus the bourgeois media doesn't bother reporting strikes. Such committees require a critical mass of unemployed to be at all an entity that could flex working class power, so how would you propose getting there from our current state?

Could just set up a stall outside a job centre, surely? There's a facebook group been set up recently to organise an unemployed workers union in the UK. This is their plan, it's worth a read:


We could have a Big Society Work Placement Scheme whereby members gained experience in union recruitment, leafleting the newly unemployed at the Job Centre, and trained to help members with benefit claims and debt problems.

Plan for unionisation:

- free membership and benefits
... - each branch to have access to one long battery life security chipped netbook and internet dongle with regularly monthly data access contract
- all members asked to work one day a week outside the job centre, recruiting and advising members*
- advice primarily practical (form filling, translation) and via online recognised advice services
- members to take it in turns to have custody of the netbook on the proviso that it can be returned early the following morning
- establish relationships with local cafes to hold advice clinics (and boost their takings)

We could do with volunteers from within DWP and those with benefits advice, CAB-style or tribunal experience to come along and offer some training days, and maybe also some training-the-trainer days, so that the skills can cascade out without needing one or two people to be available. The national (internet) Forum would pool skills and provide a free resource for everyone. Then the membership can work out what they need. Collective purchasing at the local Cash'n'Carry? Cooking workshops for cheap, good food? Transport co-ops to share the costs of car ownership?

An online learning centre, with contributions from anyone who wants to develop online learning materials in basic and not so basic skills, practical, academic or vocational.

We could provide a careers advisory service primarily focused on training and education opportunities in areas where there are jobs, or new business opportunities, and providing access to the internet for self-educational purposes. Collaborations with what local libraries are left (supported by local transport networks) to maximise access. Online volunteers sought to offer advice and free training, and training the trainer training to cascade skills.

We should seek membership from anyone who is dependent on the benefits system and aim to develop the expertise to represent them professionally and for free in any dispute, as well as developing co-operatives for minimising living expenses, work with local credit unions to make more equitable loans available to those who need them, and offer real training. And all for virtually free, unlike the parasites at A4E who take millions for providing virtually nothing.

Maybe each branch should develop their own practices, as formally or informally as they like. They can each have a subforum in the National Forum we're going to ask Urban75 to host and use it to run their affairs democratically and by consensus.

Anyone can add anything. The best ideas will get adopted and copied. And it can't really be sabotaged because no one is in charge. If a majority of the membership want an annually elected branch treasurer, then annual elections can be held. If they want them appointed and removed by common consensus, they can do that instead. Depends on what works in each local circumstance.

Alliances with small local businesses will be good too. To get union-style perks for their members, collaborate on community development work (such as small shop late night opening and shopping transport networks), And with businesses that can offer proper apprenticeships with real job prospects afterwards.

We're all in this together.


Come on, let's do it. Shouting slogans and smashing windows is fun, but the real fight back has to start now. He wants a Big Society, we'll give him a Big Society, with Big Unions and a Big Voice.